Consequences will never be the same for Glasgow Kentucky police officer Darrell Smith:
That Jose Canseco shit before it was cool (the above video happened last year).
The lack of safety shown from all parties involved is terrible. I don’t put 100% blame on the clerk obviously, but seriously dude… you don’t prove a gun is safe before you hand it to a customer? Do you not care about your own life and the lives of your coworkers, if not the customers’?
0:44 – Dat red mist. *ouch*. Lucky it didn’t go on to kill one of those 4 people where the gun was aimed!
.380 so it will buff right out after they sew the finger dust back on right guys?
According to a news story he’s suing the gun store. It will be interesting to see the result of this lawsuit considering the negligence was just as much his as the store’s. Always a strong move to blame shit on someone else though haha.
Thoughts?
Gat tip: Krystian
Comments
28 responses to “Violate A Rule Of Firearm Safety And Suffer The Consequences”
i don’t know about this, you see the cop rack the slide and nothing was in the chamber after it was handed to him but why was there ammo in the mag it makes no sense.
there are laws for gun shops here in Australia that require you to show clear to the person your handing the gun to, are there any such rules in the USA?
No such law in Pennsylvania.
This is a fudd thing. My grandfather is this way, he just can’t keep his finger off the trigger.
Yup
This happened soon after an officer here in Iowa was trying to shoot a family dog, slipped on some ice and double tapped the chest of the homeowner, killing her.
Lots of cops out there need some remedial training.
I saw the cop racking the gun as well @ 0:42. Seems strange that he didn’t even look if a round was chambered…He has his hand on top of the slide.
Both are outrageously showing some serious negligence. The most ridiculous is that they are both grown-ups whose jobs are TO HANDLE WEAPONS. This is scary. Maybe the clerk thought that the cop knew what he was doing and that he could trust him, at the same time the cop thought the clerk seemed reliable and professional, and both were wrong.
Trust doesn’t exclude control.
Or maybe this is an evil assault handgun with a high capacity clip that just went off on its own, deciding to shoot a finger because he was sooooo bored after sitting on the shelf for ages. How could I know?
And seriously, having loaded guns for sale in a crappy glass cabinet? It seems as dumb as trying to press a trigger of a gun for no reason in a public place…
If the laws of gun safety are followed, you know, when handling a gun, stuff like this would never happen. I almost can’t stand going into gun stores when they’re busy. People freak me out the way they handle them. smh
Even just one rule would have prevented this. There is no weak link in the chain of gun safety, you have to break every single one to do something like this.
“It will be interesting to see the result of this lawsuit considering the negligence was just as much his as the store’s. Always a strong move to blame shit on someone else though…”
Unfortunately, I suspect he’ll be successful in his attempt to transfer blame. The jury will decide this, and unless the jury is full of pro-gun safety conscious folks who know the four rules, this is going to come out against the store.
While I blame him 100 percent for shooting his own finger off (seriously, officer, do you even know what the four rules are?), I also agree that the guy behind the counter should have done what every gun store clerk has ever done at every gun store I’ve ever been to–rack the slide to the rear and visually confirm that there are no rounds in the gun. Were I on the jury, I’d have a hard time not allowing that the clerk messed up, but the officer should have had better gun handling skills and not been so lackadaisical when holding a firearm that he ignored all four rules at the same time.
Shrimp I 100% agree with you. After seeing this I did a little looking into some silly lawsuits like this in the 90s
http://www.weerdworld.com/2015/on-frivolous-lawsuits/
Seems all the court rulings are set up in percentage of fault when both parties show some sort of negligence. Now I really don’t agree with the breakdown of the %fault in these cases, which leads me to believe that this former officer might walk away with some money in his pocket.
Still what I hope is his lawyers ask for discovery that entails all his training and certifications with the police. They should have a pretty clear paper record of EVERY time he was trained SPECIFICALLY never to do what he did that day, and hopefully it will smooth out a motion for dismissal.
Yeah, if I were on the jury, I’d probably be predisposed towards the idea that the gun shop would “lose” the case, and the officer would “win.” As for the amounts, it would somewhere around $1,000 to $10,000 (and no lawyers’ fees) judgement in favor of the plaintiff. A low enough dollar value that the store would likely accept the judgement and not appeal, and the officer would end up paying as much or more in attorney fees than he “won.” A good outcome for all (lawyers included). Except for the officer and his finger, and that’s his own damn fault anyways.
The only way I’d change my mind on that would be if it was discovered that getting handed a loaded firearm was a rather common occurrence at that store. In that case, I’d probably hit them up for a bit more because that’s pretty irresponsible. Mistakes happen, but repeats of mistakes should not.
Jeep’s speculation is spot on. MUST have been that eeeeevil gun went psycho and attempted to shoot everyone in the store. THANK GOD the ever brave and vigilant officer sacrificed his finger to save COUNTLESS lives!!! Such heroism should not go unappreciated.
Call Shannon @ Moms Demand Stupidity. I am sure she has a place for him on her overpaid, 12 man, armed, security detail.
See! I told you fuckers dat dem guns is artificial intelligent like Skynet flavored Koolaid! It shot that cops finger right the fuck off!
Ban Em!
Lol at “Buff right out…”
Tex Grebner (guy who accidentally shot himself on youtube and narrated it, with salty language) looks classy and reasonable in comparison.
I work at a gun store. I take the mag out, lock the slide open, visually check the chamber, put the mag in, close the slide, and hand it to the customer by holding the slide. Every. Single. Time. That store owner is f***ed. There is no excusable reason to have a loaded firearm on display, and hand it loaded to a customer.
I’ve never been in a gun store that handed me a weapon with the slide closed. ALWAYS open & empty…and then I cleared it.
wise man once said: so many layers of wrong. a lasagna of wrong.
fukemboth
Had a guy hand me a loaded 357 magnum at a gun show. It was busy with people all over. I didn’t want to embarrass the guy so I discretely told his wife who was working the both with him, she on the other hand turned to her husband and yelled – This one is loaded!!! So he wasn’t spared the embarrassment after all, which perhaps was for the better.
There were a lot of ignored rules. The Cop did not have the gun pointed in a safe direction either. Everyone is lucky nobody was killed, including the other customers. Scary/stupid crap.
I could fault the clerk sure that’s easy. Gun store policy, should never have open ammo near guns for sale, especially a loaded mag.
But in over a decade as a first responder I never once saw an officer of the law handle a gun that was not cleared first. That action should be built into a cop’s muscle memory. And if you want more examples of how terrible this guy is at his job, watch how he waves the muzzle around like he is conducting an opera. Flagging every customer down the counter. This cop would be put on desk duty and lose his sidearm if he waved an unloaded gun like that during police training. But it is somehow ok because he’s in public at a store with civilians!?
Personal note, I can’t dry fire any gun, even one I have personally checked clear, into a direction where someone might be harmed by a magically loaded ghost round; never mind holding my finger over the muzzle.
This guy deserved to lose his finger and be the laughingstock of his department until he retires. What an idiot!
This all looks plenty realistic — except that if this was from a security camera mounted on the wall or ceiling, as it seems to be, why does the camera move so much?
Probably, because, as is usually the case in these kinds of “leaked footage” videos, the video was playing on a screen, and someone else recorded that while standing in front of the screen. So what you are seeing is the video playing on a screen, being recorded by someone on their cell phone/camera, hence the movement. There are literally thousands of videos on Youtube like that. My favorite one is the lady texting and walking/falling into the fountain caught on security camera. That video is clearly someone’s recording of the playback, because you can see the edges of the screen and hear them talking and laughing in the background. Doesn’t make it less enjoyable, though.
It’s not just cops or gun store commandos. Dangerous gun handling happens anywhere people of a certain mindset do it often enough to get bored and complacent.
Years ago, I was bidding on buying all the turn-in and confiscated guns held by our local Sheriff’s office. The SWAT team had permission from the county to sell them off and use the proceeds for needed equipment. As I was cataloging the inventory, I was being harassed by the SWAT guy babysitting us, who was an instructor for the preeminent firearm training facility in the U.S., that I didn’t need to keep clearing every gun I picked up. Said I was wasting his time because the guns had been in police and SWAT custody for a long time, and they were all clear. I ignored him, and kept clearing them before cataloging them.
The next gun I picked was an H&R .22 revolver, from which I removed 5 empty brass. He looked a bit embarrassed, but insisted that the gun WAS empty, because it was just empty brass. I rolled my eyes so hard I hurt myself, but I kept on going. 3 guns later, I opened a Ruger Blackhawk and extracted another piece of empty brass, then 5 .357 Magnum hollow points (the empty brass having been generated by the previous owner in the process of removing him from his mortal cares.) I walked to the SWAT deputy’s desk, dropped them one at a time from shoulder height on his blotter, and asked if he would mind if I kept doing it my way. The Sheriff saw all this and came over and asked if I’d do him a favor and clear all the guns RIGHT NOW before I went back to my work. I was happy to help.
On the basis of the video, I’m not 100% convinced that the cop didn’t load that gun himself. With a little practice, I think I could palm a cartridge into the chamber while racking the slide.
Dumbass should have cleared the gun first. It’s the *first* thing you do when someone hands you a firearm of any kind.
It’s unbelievable to me that this cop didn’t clear the gun, covered the muzzle with his hand and proceeded to pull the trigger… what the hell? How on God’s green earth can a person be that careless with a firearm? I wouldn’t trust that cop with a dull can opener after seeing how he handles guns.
“Treat every gun as a loaded gun”
“Keep finger off of the trigger until ready to shoot”
“Never cover anything with the muzzle that you are not willing to destroy”
“Know your target and what is beyond it”
Yeah, the dude covered all of ’em. Doesn’t need to be wearing that badge.
Is it possible to just charge both of them?
Fucking idiots…